But Dr. Benjamin Kligler, the research director in integrative family medicine for the Beth Israel-affiliated Continuum Center for Health and Healing and the research project’s principal investigator, acknowledged that the experiment of yoga teachers and their interaction with patients did not lend itself to the random, double-blind placebo trials favored in the medical world.

Of course, it helps that the project sponsor is the fashion designer Donna Karan and her foundation. But she has also mustered many experts, both inside and outside the yoga world, to collaborate on this effort.